


The Sixteen-Millimeter Shrine

by Macaron



Category: Call Me By Your Name (2017) RPF
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Future Fic, Halloween Challenge, Inspired by The Twilight Zone, M/M, Memories of Crema
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-08
Updated: 2018-10-08
Packaged: 2019-07-28 05:12:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,839
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16234856
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Macaron/pseuds/Macaron
Summary: "It's not like he's really busy, he just does not want to press pause. "Armie watches Call me by your name all the time and he can't simply move on with his life . He is stuck in that movie, in his head in Crema, with Timmy.Ispired by The Twilight zone for the Halloween Challenge.





	The Sixteen-Millimeter Shrine

“Mr Hammer?” No answers. “Mr Hammer? Your daughter is here.”

Armie Hammer, sixty-two years old, awakens from the sleep in which he had fallen and gives a tired smile to his maid.

"Thank you. Where is she?"

"She's waiting for you in the kitchen."

Harper has her mother's eyes. When she was just a child they always joked that Ford was the copy of Armie and Haper the copy of Elizabeth but at that time he still can recognize something of himself in his daughter's face. Now he can't, now in the young woman in his kitchen he can only see a person, not a copy of someone. He is happier in this way, he couldn't stand to look at her and see himself in her. There are days when he wouldn’t want to recognize himself even looking in the mirror.

Haper hugs him, and he stays for some seconds in that hug before being overwhelmed by the usual boring chatter you make with someone with which don't really know what to tell you.

He tries to focus on what she is saying but nothing really reaches him. Names, places, colleagues she can't stand, trips she is planning with her partner.

"Have you already gone to say hello to your mother?"

"She's not in LA right now, I think she is ..." Harper reflects for a moment. "Nola"

"Ah yes, the fourth bakery."

"I think they have to start deciding what to bake for Mardi Gras and you know mom, she's really not able to delegate, nobody is never able to do things as well as she does."

Armie smiles. He remembers  the fourth bakery, remembers Elizabeth walking around the house with two phones in her hand and Ford in her arms talking about how to paint the walls and what kind of cupcakes to launch as exclusive. Screenplays on the couch, Harper playing between his legs, singing Disney’s songs to her.  He remembers  that time when everything seemed  still possible. Armie thinks about that life and doesn’t feel anything. That seems like a world that has never belonged to him.

Harper laughs " Maybe it's not so bad, now she's stressing me so much with issues of work that it's better to have a little distance between us."

He smiles fondly to her "You know your mother, she couldn't do otherwise."

"She is so annoying!"

"She is the best. She just want to be the best mom for you." And when he says he is genuine. Even during the months of their divorce he never thought otherwise. She has always been the best, the mess was only his.

"You two are the best, dad."As she says Harper's gaze softness. "Mom is great, of course but you, you-"

"Have you talked with Ford? He is always so busy" Sixty-two years and he still doesn't know how to react to a compliments. With insults is good, he is great. With compliments, not so much.

Harper tells him the latest news from Ford and Armie loses his thoughts again.

"How are you, dad?"

"Me? I'm fine."

"I talked to your agent and it's been weeks since you read a script, he said it's been months since you last auditioned."

"It doesn’t matter” Armie shrugs. "They would end up in a rejection anyway."

"You can’t know, you're a great actor."

He ignores her. "And I'm not young anymore. I didn’t find good roles even when I was young, I was always too tall, too American, not good enough."

"You do not-" Harper tries to reply

"And it’s not like you find everyday a movie like Call me by your name."

"What does he have to do with it now?"

"Do you remember Call me by your name?"

"Of course I remember Dad, but what's that got to do with it? It's been more than thirty years."

"We never did the sequel, it was never the right time, and then we drifted apart, but I’ve rewatched it few times in the last days and there will never be another movie like that."

"Dad, are you okay?" She looks worried. His beautiful child looks worried because he can’t even fake happiness for few moments. What a shitty actor. What a shitty parent.

"Of course I'm okay.  It's just a bit of melancholy, do not worry about me Hops."

"Nobody calls me Hops, I'm not a child anymore."

You will always be Hops for me."

"Promise me you'll call your agent, dad.”

"Sure, sure, love ...  I Promise, now you'd better go, it's getting late, I have some things to do."

He accompanies her to the door, hugs her. Go back home and turn on the TV. The opening credits of Call me by your name start to appear on the screen. He doesn’t even feel guilty for lying to her. He doesn’t feel anything.

 

 

 

"Mr. Hammer is busy at the moment, you can tell me and I will report the message when he’ll be free." He hears a voice saying on the phone.

He asked him to say that. He turned off the phone and asked the maid to say that in case someone calls or shows up. It's not that he's really busy, he could answer the phone but he should stop watching the movie. On the screen, Timmy has just asked Mafalda "Mafalda dov’è Oliver?" and in the background you can hear Futile Device. No Elio has just asked Mafalda dov’è Oliver, Timmy wouldn’t speak Italian in real life.

It's not like he's really busy, he just does not want to press pause. In the last days  apparently he watches it all the time. He gets up in the morning and puts Call me by your name in the background when he does his workout, eats with the movie in the background and he can’t sleep if he does not hear the voice of Elio and Oliver coming from the screen.

"Of course, of course I'll tell him." The voice outside his room is loud but at the same time it seems so far away. On the screen, Elio is scribbling "Can’t stand the silence." and everything seems so close.

 

 

 

He has trouble sleeping at night. The doctor during is last check up said that it's normal, not a big deal, older people always sleep little, try some herbal tea maybe.

He watches Call me by your name lying on his bed and thinks about the movie, Crema, Tim, his life, the movie.

_"I'll take you home." It's ten minutes since Timmy keeps yawning slouched on the couch while they should watch a video of some boxing match that Armie loves._

_"One more!" Timmy begs._

_Armie Can’t hold back a laugh "You look like Harper when she wants me to tell her another fairytale ..."_

_"I'm not tired!"_

_Armie shakes his head, getting up "You're practically sleeping on this couch since I put on the last video"_

_Timmy takes his arm and drags him to the couch. Armie falls trying not to crush him. Where does this intimacy come from?When did this happened?_

_"Come on, ten minutes more!"_

_"Tim, it's late, I can’t get our leading man on the set with dark circles tomorrow, I'd be fired."_

_"Yes, you can."_

_"I can not."_

_Timmy bites his shoulder, playful. "You're not funny at all, old man! What would change ten minutes?"_

The night when he can’t sleep, Armie repeats that question in his head all the time. What would have changed ten minutes? What would have changed a whole night? What would have changed to say "Yes." instead of "We can not" "It's late." "You are tired." ? What would have changed to say "Stay, please stay, all night, here with me, we don’t have to do anything, just stay." Don’t leave me, just stay.

 

 

 

He doesn’t want to go to the casting but his agent called. For months nobody  called him to offer him a job, not after the last flop of a movie in which he was not even a main character (but it’s his fault, right?Always his fault). If there weren’t Elizabeth's bakeries, if it weren’t that Armie doesn’t really have many needs and has never been a shopaholic he should probably think of looking for a real job.

It's for the new film by Paul Dano, an interesting indie project. Armie didn’t even read the script, he wanted to do it, but then he came across the script of the sequel to Call me by your name and he was distracted. His agent said it’s a good role and that it is set in Italy. Changing air would be a good thing, they always say it, don’t they?

He doesn’t talk to Paul Dano, they let him meet his assistants only as if he was a background actor.

They talk to him about his role, a young grandfather. He had never imagined himself in that role, he was Oliver, he couldn’t imagine himself in another role that wasn’t Oliver.

The film is set in southern Italy. They talk about sun, marine locations and Armie thinks about flies, rivers and Crema.

Paul Dano starred in a film with Steve Carrel before making the director and while the assistant talks about his role, Armie thinks about the Beautiful Boy premiere party.

He leaves the casting without the part. He doesn’t care.

In the evening, watches  Call me by your name.

 

 

 

Harper texts him. "Stay at home tomorrow, I have a surprise for you. I love you, dad." He never goes out these days, so it's not really a big deal but it's the first things in months that makes him deserve someone's love or someone's respect. He can do it.

He doesn't recognize him when he enters in his living room. Armie is on the armchair and doesn't recognize the footsteps, he doesn't recognize the sound of the voice, he doesn't recognize the face who is smiling at him.

But nobody never said his name like him.

"Armie."

"Timmy?" He hesitates to say that name, as if he couldn’t make it correspond to the man in front of him.

Tim smiles at that indecision. "I know, I know I put on a few pounds... My new agent, my new Brian said that with fifty it was better not to be too skinny, that skinny guys seem always older and I still wanted a chance before settling for roles  as the father of the lead." He snorts.

“You are too good to be just a father of someone.”

“Yeah Yeah, tell that to the last guy who won my Oscar.”

Armie doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t know what to say. He wants Timmy, not this man. He wants curls, skinny shoulders and ridiculous mustache.

Timmy speaks quickly as if he wants to fill all those years away, as if he wants to fill that silence. He never looks at him in the eye. Armie remembers the days when they couldn’t stop looking into each other's eyes. Armie remembers the days when he thought his life had started with Timmy. Now there is a man in his living room and he doesn’t know where to put it in his life. He doesn’t know who he is, he doesn’t know what he wants. Go away. Go away, please.

"How are you?" Tim asks him. "Harper said you're not looking for a job anymore." He hesitates. "I haven’t seen your movies…"

Armie doesn’t know who this man is but at the Timmy in his head must at least give some explanation. "I gave in. I've never been as good as you, Tim. I've never had a great talent, no one has ever written articles praising my performances ... I was just a guy who worked hard, a stubborn one. I did it with Elizabeth when she had a boyfriend, I did it with the acting, and at a certain point I didn’t do it anymore ... At one point it seemed like it wasn’t worth it anymore, it was like fighting against the windmills. I was just tired, and so I no longer fought. " As he speaks his gaze crosses the television where Call me by your name is still on. His eyes meet Timmy's on screen gaze  as he talks, and when for the first time he says all of this aloud Armie only looks at that Timmy.

"You could have called, I would have been there" Timmy mumbles. "I was there, I know that we lost each other after the  sequel and that I was always busy and you stopped calling or I may have stopped answering-"

He is apologizing and Armie can’t stand him. Timmy stopped calling and he stopped answering, or maybe he stopped calling and Timmy stopped answering. They could both call and they could both answer. They didn’t do it. It’s okay.

"We could go have a drink if you like, I have nothing to do tonight, we could do something together if you like."

Armie knows that he is sincere, that her request is genuine, that it is no pity for a failed actor or a friend to whom things are not going so well. Armie knows that what's between him and Timmy has never been anything but the truth.

Armie imagines what could happen. A dinner at the Greek restaurant, a place where they went together  with Elizabeth in another life. Tim trying not to talk too much about his projects and his career because he is very sensitive and because Armie has no career or projects. His hand on Armie's shoulder, too much wine and all the possibilities in the world. That they are no longer really possibilities, they are just a box of regrets and things that have not happened, of moments when they could have said yes and instead  they said nothing. A kiss on the door of the house, a sad fuck in the living room without even having time to reach the bedroom trying to be two people who don’t exist anymore. It would be so easy. It would be a waste.

He can’t say yes. He doesn’t want to go out with that Tim, he doesn’t want him in his life. He doesn’t even want him in his house.

"I can’t, I'm very busy, I have things to do, I can’t be late, maybe I'll call you another time. Tim  it's not the right time. You are not him."

He accompanies him to the door and a part of him would like that Tim asks him to stay as when he asked him to stay ten minutes more together on the couch. But Tim is no longer that Timmy, he let it go, he moved on and Armie is still stucked  in that movie.

"Do you ever think about Crema?" He asks as Tim is leaving the house.

"Crema?" He closes the door before Timmy can finish his answer.

Go away, go away, go away. You are not him. Go away.

Stay, please stay. He says at the screen of tv.

Take me back. He says.

Stay.

 

 

 

"He is in his room. He has not come out since last evening, Miss Harper. He did not even come out when I called him for breakfast. "

"Do not worry, I'll take it to him."

Harper enters his father's room with a tray in his hand. "Daddy? Daddy? Timmy called me and said you had some appointment and you were odd, and I thought to come to say hi."

His father's bedroom his empty. Harper knocks at the bathroom's door and come in but nobody is there too. The windows are close and Harper sighs with relief (why should you relieved if your father's bedroom has the windows closed? It's not normal).

She tries to call him at the phone but it's in the bedstand.

His father is totally gone. Gone, disappeared.

Maybe he went somewhere. Maybe he woke up early and go out. Maybe he'll call when he'll come home. I should ring Ford, Harper thinks. Maybe he called him. Maybe he just need some time, some fresh air. It's good that he finally left this house, with all his movies and this toxic air. Maybe he'll be fine.

Before leaving, she hears the sound of television, she hasn't even noticed that because she had been busy looking for his father, but he can not help to smile at hearing Armie's voice come out of the telly. He was really amazing as Oliver.

 

 

Inside the television screen, Armie watches Timmy run to meet him.

He knows this isn’t a dream. He knows it’s real.

Timmy hugs him and he is not Tim, or Timothée Chalamet, he is not fifty, he still is twenty. He is Elio, he is his Timmy. Armie knows very well that if he looked at himself in the mirror he would see Oliver. Crema is all around them.

Armie lets himself breathe in that hug.

"Oliver Oliver Oliver" Timmy whispers to him. And then "Armie Armie Armie".

"Timmy."

It feels like a homecoming.

**Author's Note:**

> This is the Charmie version of one of the first episodes of the classic Twilight zone series, The Sixteen-Millimeter Shrine, who is amazing as all the show.  
> As always I write in english as Oliver speaks italian.


End file.
